[FoxNews] President Biden invoked a Cold War-era law in a surprising move Friday to pour taxpayer funds into domestic manufacturing of electric heat pumps, an alternative to gas-powered residential furnaces.
In a joint announcement with the White House, the Department of Energy (DOE) said the federal government would award a "historic" $169 million for nine projects across 15 sites nationwide in an effort to accelerate electric heat pump manufacturing. The significant level of funding was made possible after Biden utilized the 1950 Defense Production Act (DPA) to increase domestic production of green energy technologies.
"Getting more American-made electric heat pumps on the market will help families and businesses save money with efficient heating and cooling technology," said Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm. "These investments will create thousands of high-quality, good-paying manufacturing jobs and strengthen America’s energy supply chain, while creating healthier indoor spaces through home-grown clean energy technologies."
"Today’s Defense Production Act funds for heat pump manufacturing show that President Biden is treating climate change as the crisis it is," added John Podesta, the White House clean energy czar. "These awards will grow domestic manufacturing, create good-paying jobs, and boost American competitiveness in industries of the future."
Under the actions announced Friday, the DOE will send millions of dollars to companies like Copeland, Honeywell International, Mitsubishi Electric and York International Corporation, all of which are billion-dollar multinational corporations. The projects will advance manufacturing of industrial, commercial and residential heat pump technology.
The action Friday comes less than two months after the DOE issued new regulations targeting traditional home gas-powered furnaces as part of its climate agenda and broad effort to curb greenhouse gas emissions.
DOE's finalized regulations, which are slated to go into effect in 2028, specifically require furnaces to achieve an annual fuel utilization efficiency (AFUE) of 95%, meaning manufacturers would only be allowed to sell furnaces that convert at least 95% of fuel into heat within six years. The current market standard AFUE for a residential furnace is 80%.
Because of the stringent AFUE requirements, the regulations would largely take non-condensing gas furnaces — which are generally less efficient, but cheaper — off the market. But consumers who replace their non-condensing furnace with a condensing furnace after the rule is implemented face hefty installation costs.
Biden previously invoked the DPA to accelerate domestic critical mineral production and to pause tariffs on Chinese solar panel imports, claiming that climate change is a national emergency.
In addition to consumer furnaces, over the last several months, the DOE has unveiled new standards for a wide variety of other appliances including gas stoves, clothes washers, refrigerators and air conditioners. According to the DOE, its past and planned appliance regulations will save Americans $570 billion and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by more than 2.4 billion metric tons over the next 30 years.
There are two types of Heat Pumps, 'Air-to-air' and Geothermal. Air-to-air heat pumps scavenge heat from the air around them. Geothermal heat pumps scavenge heat through a system of underground pipes, using the typically temperatures below the ground.
Both types are more efficient than a conventional system for heating and cooling.
The Air-to-air systems don’t work well in climates that experience freezing weather and have a shorter life span than conventional systems if run year round.
Geothermal systems are much better, but installation of the underground piping systems required for these can be REALLY pricey. Also almost impossible if one lives over the top of any type of rock structure.
Posted by: Mullah Richard ||
11/18/2023 7:31 Comments ||
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#4
Like their EV plans, the end product uses the power that they are failing to build plants for.
#5
It seems like this should be challenged. He can cite Valley Forge and Chosin Reservoir but he better be prepared to airdrop us Tootsie Rolls.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
11/18/2023 8:46 Comments ||
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#6
Finally! A solution to the Nation-Wide Heat Pump Shortage!!! I have spent countless nights tossing and turning trying to find one and the solution was simple, just tell Stumblin’ Joe to invoke the DPA to solve the crisis that isn’t.
What a frickin’ train wreck.
#11
At first I thought it was the Bee. So they already banned most refrigerants, so the next step will be to convert from gas then make the refrigerants illegal. nice pley commie Biden.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
11/18/2023 9:59 Comments ||
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#12
The Heat Pump can actually extract enough heat from cooler outside air to heat an area, until it gets below a certain temperature.
Elves, magic and compressor pumps.
Posted by: Mullah Richard ||
11/18/2023 10:09 Comments ||
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#13
Let me guess: Uses 1500W electricity to provide 750W of heat.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
11/18/2023 10:41 Comments ||
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#14
Next up: Biden DoE will ban dryers and demand people use clotheslines instead to 'save the planet'.
#16
My mother refused to have a dryer. She could have, easily, but she liked hanging clothes on the line.
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
11/18/2023 12:09 Comments ||
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#17
All I can say is, if you live in a climate like central Florida, if you can't put your clothes on a line as soon as they are out of the washing machine (rainy day) you are going to have mildewed clothing right quick.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
11/18/2023 12:12 Comments ||
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[RedState] In the realm of national security, how important is genderqueerness? According to a recently revealed document, it deserves great regard.
The Daily Wire has published the National Security Agency's 34-page Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Glossary. The list of terms and their meaning solidly set the Defense Department's Woke level to Red.
The agency has an aim, and it's safety -- of feelings. Hence, the following words are featured:
Allyship
Marginalization
Microaggression
Micro-Insults
Micro-Invalidation
Lots more words, lots more definitions, lots of links. But you get the drift I’m sure, dear Reader.
Posted by: NoMoreBS ||
11/18/2023 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[11131 views]
Top|| File under: Tin Hat Dictators, Presidents for Life, & Kleptocrats
#1
Whatever happened to "The purpose of the military is to kill people and break things"?
We should thank the Lord every day for the oceans protecting us (No foreign army on our soil since 1814.) I have less and less confidence in anything else as time goes on.
Posted by: Tom ||
11/18/2023 7:34 Comments ||
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#4
#1,#3 That is still the mission. Mind you, the "people and things" bit is undergoing review / alteration. Think: who currently represents greatest threat to the regime?
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
11/18/2023 9:52 Comments ||
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#5
"Echelon Insights research institute purports to show that 72% of American voters would not be willing to volunteer to fight for their country if the United States faced a major conflict."
Suddenly, the 7 million single, military age males admitted into the country so far makes total sense. And since they are not even remotely American, the Army they serve has no problem who they might fight and loot.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
11/18/2023 14:18 Comments ||
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#7
If you take American youth that are educated and healthy enough to do what combat demands (in order to survive the environment*), you are getting closer to a single digit. Take out 'white supremacists', and you are definitely in the single digits.
[Breitbart] A Colorado district court judge ruled Friday that Donald Trump must be placed on the ballot in the 2024 presidential contest.
Judge Sarah Wallace, appointed in 2022 by Democrat Gov. Jared Polis, ruled that Trump did engage in insurrection on January 6, 2021, but was not an officer of the United States as defined by the Fourteenth Amendment.
The lawsuit cited the Fourteenth Amendment’s “,” which bans those who “engaged in insurrection” from holding federal office, as justification for booting Trump from the ballot.
Trump’s attorneys had claimed he never “engaged in insurrection” and that his questioning of the 2020 election results is political speech protected by the First Amendment.
“Trump’s comments did not come close to ‘incitement,’ let alone ‘engagement’ in an insurrection,” they wrote.
Wallace disagreed.
Yet she looked more favorably upon Trump’s team’s argument that the amendment does not apply to the office of the president. The text of the amendment specifies “Senator or Representative in Congress” and “elector of President and Vice President” but not “President.”
Trump has not been convicted of insurrection and was acquitted by the U.S. Senate of charges of engaging in insurrection and continues to deny wrongdoing.
Wallace previously denied a motion by Trump’s legal team that she step aside due to her past donation to a liberal group working to keep Trump off the ballot — the very thing her ruling Friday accomplished — along with donations to many Democrat candidates for office. She had also previously denied a motion by Trump and the Colorado GOP to throw the case out.
Trump continues to face legal challenges in numerous states across the country, but has had a string of favorable rulings.
A federal court in New Hampshire recently dismissed a similar case, ruling that the Fourteenth Amendment claim is a “nonjusticiable political question.” A Minnesota state court recently dismissed a lawsuit aiming to keep Trump off that state’s primary ballot. And a Michigan Court of Claims judge ruled that the Secretary of State must list Trump on the ballot as well.
An appeal is likely. The Colorado case, or another similar case in another state, could likely land before the Supreme Court, which has never before ruled on the Civil War-era amendment.
***Update***
Steven Cheung, Trump spokesperson, responded with the Trump Campaign Statement on the legal victory in Colorado:
“We applaud today’s ruling in Colorado, which is another nail in the coffin of the un-American ballot challenges. With this decision, Democrats’ 14th Amendment challenges have now been defeated in Colorado, Michigan, Minnesota and New Hampshire. These cases represent the most cynical and blatant political attempts to interfere with the upcoming presidential election by desperate Democrats who know Crooked Joe Biden is a failed president on the fast track to defeat. The American voter has a Constitutional right to vote for the candidate of their choosing, with President Donald J. Trump leading by massive numbers. This right was correctly preserved in Colorado today and we urge the swift disposal of any and all remaining Democrat ballot challenges. Onward to total victory 2024, we will Make America Great Again!”
The case is Anderson v. Griswold, No. 2023CV32577, in district court for the city and county of Denver.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
